Keep moving
by WheresmyTony
Summary: Alex Barton - back in town. Everything's cool, right? Huh, well. Family, PTSD, school, Hydra, friends and a giant lizard… I guess we can call this the usual stuff by now? - sequel to "Alex" (definitely should be read before this one) Rated T for language and violence and stuff.
1. While I was gone

_**horseluvr00:**__ noooooooooo D: Nah, it's not over :D As long as I'm a Marvel fangirl and they keep making movies I'll probably keep writing this so don't worry ^^ I'm soooo glad you like it and I thank _you_ for being part of what keeps me writing here! So, hope you stay tuned and that I meet up to your expectations ^^_

_**acompletenerd:**__ Thank you^^ Right, thank you! I totally wouldn't have thought about that myself :D_

_**EpicPackage:**__ hehee… Thank you ^^ I hope you'll like this one too_

_There we are, this is the sequel to "Alex" so I hope you all read it because otherwise this won't make any sense at all. Those are the latest reviews to the last chapter of "Alex", I wanted to answer them too. And, yeah, I hope you'll like this story too and tell me what you think about it this far ^^_

_._

"You were shot?" his voice kinda breaks and he looks at me like he wants me to say 'no, just kidding'. But why should I joke about this. I nod my head but I won't show him the scar. It's one thing to show it my family because like 50% of my family has (bullet) scars of their own so we're all more or less used to this, but Peter – I mean, he grew up with my family as well but… there's just some difference and before he asks to see it, which I don't really think he will, I scoop up some more ice that mostly I am eating if just so I don't have to look up that much.

I keep talking, about Saka and his family, Postma killing them and I don't know how many more. I skip the details of that hallucination and how I got Dad out of there, though by the look on his face it's definitely obvious he at least assumes that I killed them. I don't tell him how many there were because saying it out loud would make it real, it would stop being just in my head and I – I can't explain this to him so I just don't say it at all.

I've given him the short version too and now I'm staring into the melting ice cream set between us in the middle of the bed and he hasn't eaten any of it yet, just stared at me still with tears in his eyes that I refuse to look into because I know if I do I could just as well crawl under the bed and not come out again.

"You were dead" his voice breaks and I have to force myself to look up to see that one tear roll down his cheek. "You were dead, there – there was … there was a funeral and … fuck, you were dead!" he's getting louder by the end of it and I'm almost close to _begging_ him not to yell at me but I'd deserve it. For everything I put him, everyone through, I'd deserve worse, but he doesn't. He's quiet again, wipes the back of his hand over his eyes and goes back to staring at me.

He keeps looking at me, quietly and I know he's just trying to stop any other tears from falling. I'm starting to wonder if it might've been easier if he just yelled at me or not, I guess not, but either way I hate this silence. And I know I shouldn't wait for him to break it, should say something myself. But I just don't know what.

Saying sorry won't cover it and probably only end with him really snapping. So I don't say anything at all and keep poking around in the melting ice cream.

"They sent photos" and at this my head snaps up. Why did _he_ see them? "Torunn texted me when you wouldn't answer and she asked when you were coming back home and I had no idea what she was even talking about. Apparently you were supposed to stay here? I came over Sunday morning and Tony, Bruce, Mason, Vic, Natasha… _everyone,_ they were all hovering over their computers and searching for you… I mean, they came up with you being to Amsterdam almost immediately but they had to make sure. Natasha and Steve took the jet to Amsterdam and when they told us they were landing, Torunn disappeared. She went there too and you were gone. They all tracked Postma, they were so close but I – I don't know how but they lost her and came back and Natasha was so done with everything… We were _all_ in the living room and Jarvis said his security something was overwritten and before anyone could maybe get at least James and Lucy out of the room, the TV turned on and Postma was talking but it was too short to track down. She said you put up a fight and they had to kill you. And then she stopped talking and there were pictures of you with a slit throat and –"

"I know, she showed me the photos" I say it mostly to spare him from saying it. And cause I don't want to hear it.

"They – They kept searching you but you were gone and eventually we buried another empty coffin but they kept searching for Postma. They found most of her people but I don't know if they found her. Goddammit, you were dead. You just vanished and then – Damnit, Alex, you were _dead_."

They've _all_ seen those photos and as far as I know Postma probably just so got away before they could kill her too and found me in India… Now it makes even less sense why she didn't just kill me there. Okay, screw this I don't want him to keep talking now, I don't want him to tell me how much I screwed up here, I don't wanna hear it.

"I'm sorry" I can't help saying it, it doesn't hold enough meaning but it simply is the only thing I manage to say because I'm crying for minutes already again and know I'm going to lose it. Peter scoffs at this, runs his hand through his hair and I put the ice on the floor and close the distance between us and tuck my head under his chin, once more crying into his shirt. "I just-"

I don't know what I want to say, but he still nods his head and keeps running his hand through my hair.

.

Later I text my Mom that I'll come back tomorrow morning because it's already getting dark and we just still have a lot to talk about. I feel bad about not being home with them after being dead for four months, but the same applies to Peter and so I just have to stop thinking right now.

Instead I'm sitting on his bed while he goes to answer the door for some Chinese take-out.  
>There were always a lot of photos in his room, mostly of us or some with Torunn, but now there are definitely a lot more of just me all over his walls. His computer is still turned on from when he was sitting in front of it when I knocked and his background is a <em>very<em> stupid selfie I sent him once when my hair was standing about two meters above my head and wouldn't go down again.

"I see your stalker level did rise again" I say when he comes back into the room and nod to the picture of me thrown over his shoulder (however he managed that) pinned to the mess of photos on the wall next to his bed.

"It can actually rise? Cool, didn't know that was still possible" he smirks a little before pushing the box into my hands and sitting down beside me again. We eat in silence for most of the time and I keep trying to come up with something to say but I don't know what. We never ran out of things to say, but now we just both don't know what to say without it seeming weird I think.

Well, at least that's for me. Peter of course can pull anything out of his sleeve if he gets five minutes to think.

"Wanna watch a movie?" It's not really the thing you do when you come back from the dead after four months, but we both don't know what else to do and so Peter turns on a Disney movie on his computer. Okay, usually we'd probably watch some bad action movie that we could comment on end and laugh about, but I guess he thinks something like this might trigger something here (which I think too), so we rather watch something simple.

It's enough to get us to make stupid comments and laugh about it and for me to fall asleep with my head on Peter's shoulder somewhere around the third movie.

.

My lungs are burning and I can still hear them running after me but every time I glance over my shoulder I can't see anything. Well, I can't see anything in front of me either, it's pitch black. My hands touch the walls on my left and right but they are slowly coming closer until my shoulders both slide over the walls. There are probably a thousand splinters already in my hands and arms but I can't think about it, I have to keep running because they're right behind me. The walls keep coming closer and my right shoulder catches on something sticking out of the wall, I don't know what, maybe a nail or something. I hear myself cry out distantly but I keep running until, without any warning, the floor gives out and I'm falling. Something cracks in my wrist and I struggle to stand up.

It's no longer dark, I'm in a warehouse and over a railing I can see the ground level where tons of debris and trash is piling high, but still I'm standing pretty high above this and falling down would at _least_ cause some serious damage.

I don't hear them until it's too late. The one with the rusty pipe must be closest to me because I feel it hitting me in the back and I'm being knocked to the ground and all air leaves my lungs. A foot is kicking me in the rips, nonstop and I can hear and feel it crack twice before they do stop.

They pull me off the floor and Dad is hitting my head against the railing, he holds me against it so I'm halfway leaning over it and he's choking me. He steps aside a bit, his hand still on my neck, so I can see Mom and she's grinning and wields the pipe in her hand. Then she swings and slams the pipe into my stomach, above my left hip bone and I can't even scream. Blood starts pouring out and they both start to laugh. With another grin, Dad pushes me over the railing and I wake up to my screaming.

I gasp awake and it's dark and someone is grabbing my arm and, if it weren't for the breathtaking pain in my side, I would struggle to get away. But this way the only thing I find myself able to do is curl on my side, gasping and wheezing and trying to get some air back in my lungs. A light is turned on and the hand is back on my shoulder and I try to move away from it but I can't.

"Alex" is what I hear and, realizing it's Peter's voice, I open my eyes and see all the pictures on the wall right in front of me and one of his _very_ rare polaroid pictures of me asleep leaning on Peter's shoulder is pinned in front of my face and that picture is from tonight, me with short hair and the cut through my eyebrow.

I'm fine. Okay, that's a relief but I still can't find it in myself to really care because the pain is still there, still real. I keep pressing my hand to the bullet wound, expecting it to come back bloody, but it's not bleeding. I know that, but I still check every few seconds and try not to cry out when I touch my hand to it. It feels like being shot all over again and I know I'm just imagining it, I know that, but knowing this isn't helpful at all. And it definitely doesn't stop me from crying into the pillow and staring at the pictures in front of my face.

God, this hurts so fucking bad.

Peter keeps running his hand over my shoulder, trying to calm me down a bit. I bet I gave him quite a heart attack, if I really just randomly started to scream in my sleep.

I hear him repeating "it's okay" over and over, quietly and I think more to himself or if just so there's less suffocating silence. But he's here. He's fine and so am I and everyone else and my mind is just completely fucked up, that's all.

It takes a way too long while until the pain is getting a little bit better and Peter lies back down. He leaves the light on and hesitantly wraps his arm around me, but the "it's okay" doesn't stop. Eventually the imagined pain subsides enough for me to turn around and, for the third time since I'm back, to just cry into his chest.

I don't know how long it takes me to calm down, but I know that when I do, he falls back asleep. It's soothing to hear his even breaths beside me, though I don't manage to go back to sleep again.

.

It's around nine when we get up and Ben and May ask if I'm alright and if we want breakfast or if I need anything and blah. They mean well, I know and I probably woke them up too tonight but I just _won't_ talk about that. Also neither me nor Peter are really hungry, so we leave eventually and then, of course, grab a coffee and wander around aimlessly for a while. Apparently we're making our way to the graveyard which I realize when we're already walking through the rows of gravestones. A lot of the stones have the same date written on them, of the Chitauri attack.

"Natasha wanted that empty coffin at least buried next to your Dad's empty coffin, but Fury wouldn't cause you're no S.H.I.E.L.D. agent and blah. So, happy birthday, you've got your own empty grave here" he says and stops, motioning to the mostly blank stone in front of us. It doesn't really say anything else but my name, my birthday and the day they declared me dead.

There are a couple of flowers and tucked behind them is Lucy's plush giraffe, dirty and missing one ear.

My stomach drops a little because five months ago, she'd never lay it out of her hand and now? She gave it to me and now it's rotting on my grave that I'm not lying in.

After staring down for a while, I pick the animal up. Peter wraps his arm around my shoulders and rests his head on top of mine for a moment before we silently agree to leave again.

We are walking around the city for a while longer before we start to go into the general direction of the Tower.

I keep staring down at the damn giraffe that I never thought would ever leave Lucy's grasp. It still makes my stomach drop, but at the same time I keep reminding myself that everything is fine. It's over, Dad and I are back home, we're alive and so is my whole family. The whole Hydra issue is another thing that eventually has to be dealt with, but for now everything is alright. We're alive and I made it out of there and I'm scared of what's gonna happen, but right _now_ it's fine. I won't think about that dream tonight, I won't think about what I did, what happened. I'll just remind myself that I'll never pull such crap ever again and that everything else will eventually work out. Because I know it will. It just has to.


	2. Keeping busy

_**Horseluvr00: **__Hehe, yes! I'm thrilled that you like it ^^ Tell me if you like this one too_

_**Justarandomguest:**__ Thank you :3 I honestly haven't completely decided on that yet, we'll see^^_

_**EpicPackage: **__D: why do you think it wouldn't work out? Thanks, I hope you'll stay for the rest!_

_**Currahee506:**__ Here you have more^^_

_**PeterWho/The Unicorn:**__ Thank you for finishing it :D and of course for the fabulous unicorn review. Hope your family won't think you're crazy now… . not more than before, at least… aaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaand yeah, have fun with this, if you keep reading this, what you have to cause I'll throw it in your face…. PEACE Ron!_

_Alright, hear me out. First: I'm fucking sorry it took me so long again. I kinda have the ability to get the first chapter of a story out in a flash and then immediately lose focus on it. I always need time to get back into a story, although it picks up right where we left off. I don't know, I still gotta figure out where _exactly_ I am going with this story in which kind of way so it's gonna take me a while more to get completely back into this. Also I can't promise to be extremely quick in writing and updating (not that I had a regular updating schedule up to now anyways) because of school and work. But I promise you guys with all my soul that I will keep writing this that I will keep updating this because I can't just let this go and I really feel bad knowing you're waiting for an update which I don't deliver. _

_So I'm asking of you to just be patient with me like always and I promise that I will do my best to not take months to update because this story and all you guys reading this means a lot to me and I won't let my baby Alex be stuck suffering for all eternity just cause I'm a lazy shit. _

_Anyways. This is really pretty much just a filler chapter to not have you guys wait any longer. It's not great or anything but I just wanted to give you _something_ just to let you know I'm still here. So, now I'll stop talking and although this isn't great, maybe some of you still tell me what you think or what you might like to see in future chapters, you're always welcome to spoil me with ideas, headcanons, whatever, really, anything that could get me to write is more than welcome and appreciated. So. Here it is and I'll try to be back as fast as possible._

.

Peter stays over for the rest of the day and ends up staying the night too. This time I don't wake up from a nightmare though, but from the horrible sound that is Peter's alarm clock. Which somehow doesn't wake him up, so I hit him in the face with a pillow until he groans and tries to push me away.

"Turn that shit off"

It takes him exactly until my Dad shuffles into my room that he manages to turn it off after almost dropping his phone in the progress.

"The hell was _that_?" I hear Dad mumble from the doorway. "It sounded like an elephant giving birth." Okay, at that I lift my head from underneath the pillows.

"…How the hell would you know what _that _sounds like?"

"Ugh, happened way before you were born, kiddo" he says with a tired wave of his hand. "'m going back to bed, you don't need me, right?" He doesn't wait for any kind of answer, he's already through the door and Peter is snoring beside me again.

"Dude, I'm not the one who's gotta get up" School is the last thing on my mind right now, though I know that I wouldn't pass this year anyway, with me missing for most of the year. Still, Peter has to go and actually I want to go back to sleep, so I move to hit him with the pillow again but he just pulls it from my hand and hits me instead. "Dude!"

Pf, he doesn't stop so I start to kick him until he hits the floor. Simple.

"Go learn something" I mumble into the pillow and get hit in the head once more. I hear him shuffling around the room, gathering his stuff purposely loud. I know he still stands in the doorway but I can't really find it in myself to move anymore because I'm starting to fall asleep again despite his best efforts to be as loud as he can.

"See ya" I hear him say and after I groaned my answer into the pillow, I hear the door close behind him. It's too early to feel out of place yet so I just will myself to go back to sleep, at least for a little while.

.

I get up around ten and make myself some cornflakes. While doing so I see the little post-it on the counter saying they went to the park, probably to just get some time to themselves to talk. I don't really know what to do with myself right now so I get into the elevator and check if anyone is upstairs. No one is, so I get back in and to the second alternative, the lab. Really, if no one is upstairs then they're either in the gym or in the lab.

Usually though there is chaos when I go down here, I once got hit in the head by a flying hand of one of Tony's suits and passed out for a couple of minutes. But now it's pretty quiet, it's just Tony, Bruce and Jane and Steve too, typing away on their screens.

"What're you doing?" is how I say hi and they only really look up for a second before they let Steve talk and go back to typing.

"Uh, basically trying to get everything about Hydra there is."

Right, that's an issue, no matter how much I tell myself it isn't.

"You want anything?" Tony changes the subject with that and it takes me a short moment to figure out what to say.

"Yeah, actually… I was wondering if you guys know anything that happened to the whole Wij nemen thing…" I trail off there because I'm not really sure where that even came from. I haven't given much thought to the whole thing yet but fact is I need to know what happened to the other people involved with Postma or Bolschakow.

"Okay, what do you wanna know?" Good question. I don't know. I don't wanna find out anything, to be honest, but at the same time I really _have_ to find out what happened to Robin or Ruma or Neele or _everyone_ there.  
>It leaves a sickening feeling in my stomach thinking about them, but I just <em>need <em>to know what happened when I was gone.

"In India… Postma said you guys destroyed everything?" I say, looking at Steve as the representing member of 'you guys'. "What'd she mean by that? You got close?"

Steve sighs before answering slowly. "Yeah, we managed to get a hold of her around the end of March. We found a huge hideout where they kept all the hostages drugged up"

Okay so that's probably where I woke up. I doubt Postma had several places where she kept these many people.

"Postma had quite some people there, fighting us or at least distracting us long enough so she could get away, though I think she was injured… I couldn't get to her in time" Well, that'd explain the wound when she found me. Steve looks guilty when he says this… it's not like killing Postma then would change much about the fact that I already was at Bolschakow's… Only that she wouldn't have send me to Alaska and I wouldn't have found Dad there. So technically it was a good thing she got away… although I knew where Dad probably was when I was in India so…

"When we got there – Postma's people shot all the hostages. They were all dead."

Fuck.

"How many were there?" I ask, despite the growing lump in my throat.

"Twenty six"

Well, at least he doesn't sugar-coat it. I close my eyes for a second against the feeling of having to throw up. So Robin is dead just as his brother. Or gone and sold to wherever the hell. And everyone else Postma had there at that moment. Wherever the hell she sold others to I probably won't ever find out. Or how many that were. Or how many of them are dead now.

"What about Postma?"

"We kept tracking her but eventually we lost her trace and couldn't pick it up anymore. I don't know what happened to her after she found you."

So she's still alive.

"Do you know anything else? About India? The other girls in Bolschakow's house? Or the slum?"

How should they, though? They only know about India since I told them about it so…

"No… but I think if you can give me some more time I can find out some stuff. What'd it all look like?" Tony mutters over the display in front of him.

"Well, it was a huge-ass villa in the middle of nowhere in freaking India so – no, I dunno. The slum looked like a slum where Postma killed at least four people so-" I stop myself. I don't _have_ anything else to say. There is not really anything I saw there, it's not like I've been locked up most of the time and beaten up for not letting him rape me.

Tony, Steve and Bruce just look at me and it's Jane who thankfully breaks the silence.

"Alright, we'll see what we find" and with that she pushes Bruce and Tony back to their screens and her and Steve do so too after a moment more. That leaves me standing there stupidly while they type away. So, after exactly fifteen seconds of this I can't stand it and get up and out, walking upstairs again.  
>The thing is that now I don't have any idea what to do. I couldn't possibly help them finding stuff about Bolschakow, because I <em>can't<em> and I don't want to know it but at the same time _have _to.

But now, that everyone is busy, I am not. There's really no one at home right now except for the science bros + Jane and Steve. Everyone is at school or daycare or work or just out cause they were dead for five freaking months.

So I try to distract myself with some TV but after five minutes I give up on that and settle on my window sill to stare out the window for exactly two minutes. I consider banging my head against the wall when I remember the books Jo gave me and the little note in there. So I get up and search through the books for the little slip of paper.  
>I start up my still slightly dusty laptop and while doing so I search for Jake and Dirk's email addresses too.<p>

I don't know what fancy stuff to write into such an email, so I settle for simply thanking them for everything, that we're fine and everything's gonna be fine here. But at least I told them we're fine and that's about everything I could say, right?

Okay so what now? That barely got me ten minutes and it's not even eleven yet, what the hell am I supposed to do all day? God, I'm gonna get insane here!

I stroll through the internet for a little while but there is like really _nothing_ to keep my mind off of things so I end up closing the laptop again and spinning around on my chair until I'm feeling sick.  
>I get up only to throw myself on my bed face first which I claim as a freaking stupid idea. I somehow hit myself in the side with my elbow and spend a minute groaning into my pillow.<p>

Alright.  
>I get up and gather all the laundry still piling on my windowsill (cause I needed space on my desk) and throw it out of my room and into the hallway. I tell Jarvis to start some music and within a matter of three hours I've sorted through my whole closet and desk and shelves and threw everything out that I don't need, cleaned my whole room (even my freaking window) and am currently doing my bed.<p>

"Woah – what happened _here_?" I hear my Mom say from the doorway and I turn around to see her looking pretty shocked at me cleaning my room. On my own. "Are you okay?"

Of course she'd ask that. I _never_ clean my room, not without having to be told for like four weeks, it's always a mess here so of course it is kinda weird to see me throwing everything out just like that.  
>But at least I didn't think about anything in the past three hours so for now I actually feel alright.<p>

"Yeah" I say with a shrug and throw the pillow onto my bed.

I receive a similar reaction from my Dad a minute later. Geez, what a big deal this seems to be…

Okay so now it's around two pm and after I take a shower, I spend the rest of the day frantically trying to keep my mind off things. I help Mom and Dad make lunch for the whole troop (a thing we about never do cause we are like the least talented cooks in this tower), bother everyone the whole day to keep my mind off things and eventually I manage to get this day over with and am pretty surprised that I even fall asleep kind of fast.

That doesn't mean I sleep well, though.


	3. Not a doll fan

_**Unicorn:**__ vielleicht…._

_**Someone:**__ Thank you ^^_

_Again, hello friendos! First, I wanna tell you about the thing I did yesterday. Or, better, you check it out yourself cause I explained it all there. You can find it on my page, it's called 'Being family' (mostly because I couldn't come up with something better) and it belongs to the whole Alex stuff. You might give it a try, tell me if you want me to write something._

_Okay, and second, I didn't expect to update already. I planned this chapter out but the way I wanted it, it would be pretty long so __I just made a cut where I am and the second part of this chapter will be written now and will hopefully be up in a couple of days._

_I hope you can forgive me for the crappy last chapter and that you take a look at the new thing and really tell me what you think, what you want me to write and how you like this chapter here. I hope you will like it… and I'll try to be back with the rest of this as fast as I can!_

_Peace!_

_._

After three hours of staring out of the window or up to the ceiling I decide it's so not worth it anymore and get out of bed. It's barely five am but I definitely won't be able to go back to sleep tonight. So I'll just get out of my room and shuffle to the elevator. I'm tired but there's really too much stuff on my mind right now that I just _can't_ sleep.

So I make my way up to the roof, though when the elevator stops the doors don't open.

"C'mon Jarvis" I say with a sigh "I'm not gonna do anything, just open the door, okay? I need some air."

God, it's not like I'm gonna do a backflip off the roof now.

It takes half a minute until he opens the doors without a word and I step out into the rather cold night. I make my way over to the railing, sit down where I always do and let my still bare feet hang in the air.

It takes about two minutes until I hear the doors open again and someone's walking across the roof to where I am sitting. I look up for just a moment to see Mom sitting down next to me.

"Jarvis told me you were up here" of course he did.

"Jarvis exaggerates, I wasn't planning on doing backflips up here."

"No?" when I look at her, she's smirking that trademark killer smile that can make drug smugglers piss their pants. I lean my head against her shoulder with a small smile and we both just look over the city for a while.

"You ever thought of… you know? Just –" Just backflipping off the fucking roof? I never really _actually _thought about it, there's no reason for it, but I just- My parents went through so much more shit than I ever could, I could never possibly _mentally_ survive so many horrible things like they did. And now, after years of really pretty much only torture, my Mom had to bury her husband and fucking stupid daughter and I have not a single idea how my Mom went through these past few months.

"Yeah, not only once" she scoffs and wraps her arm tighter around my shoulders. "I always thought, Why it's gotta be me, Why do _we_ have to give everything? But you know what? Every single thing lead to this _really_ weird family and to such a brave and smart and strong daughter. There's always something worth it and really, I wouldn't trade it for a damn thing."

I let that sink in for a moment but I can't come up with a decent response, so I just nod my head against her shoulder and we stay silent for a couple more minutes.

"YA skuchal po tebe" (I missed you) I hear myself mumble and a second later she has her head settled on top of mine and keeps pressing kisses into my hair and whispers something that I'm just too tired to actually listen to.

.

We go back inside when the sun's already up and my feet are two frozen clumps. About everyone is already off to school or work or has just randomly dematerialized themselves, you never know in this family. But because everyone's already busy, we stay on our own level.

When we step out of the elevator, Dad's sitting on the couch with a bowl of cereals and watches some cartoon James totally digs. I get myself a bowl too while Mom sits down on the couch. As soon as I'm sitting, Dad nearly throws away his bowl because I might have placed my frozen feet not so lightly on his lap.

"Holy shit, are you dying?!"

"Nah, don't think so" I say around a spoonful and turn my attention to the TV. After a minute Dad sets his now empty bowl on the coffee table and nearly crushes my feet with his hands in an attempt to warm them up. Which, after I finished my food, ends up with him tickling me until I roll off the couch and just take a goddamn shower because I'm really still freezing and maybe this is gonna wake me up a bit.

It helps with getting warmer, but the second thing is probably a lost fight today.

When I look into the mirror I look really pretty tired, but at least I'm somewhat looking like myself again. My hair is still mostly blonde but the bruises on my face have for the most part completely faded by now. Only if you look really closely you can still see some bruising on my eye, but that's it. The cut through my eyebrow is healing as are all the other cuts on my arm and forearm. The bullet wound is mostly fine too I think, it only really hurts when put under pressure and I'm not exactly about to do that all the time.

With a sigh I turn away and slip into jeans and a t-shirt before going back into the living room where my parents are kind of busy licking each other's faces off.

"Ugh, get a room" I say and throw a pillow to the back of Dad's head as I hop back on the couch. "Or better don't, I think we've got enough kids running around here."

At that Dad snorts and the pillow lands in my face before I can even react. That gets him a kick to the leg and usually we'd be having a little sparring match by now but now he just laughs it off and gets off the couch to follow my Mom, wherever the hell that is.

At one point they tell me they go down to the gym and I stay on the couch watching crappy morning TV until I eventually even doze off for about an hour or two.

That is until I wake up to Lucy chewing extremely loudly on a cracker in front of my face.

"Yay, you're up!" God, how can a three year old be so freaking loud. "Want some?" she asks, holding out her hand full with little crackers while nearly spitting the one she's chewing on in my face.

"…yes" I grumble and take two from her tiny hand. "What's up, kiddo?"

"I'm bored" she says with a shrug and I sit up with a groan.

"So you just wait for me to wake up because of your _really_ loud chewing?" She nods her head at this and demonstratively chews the last crackers extra loudly. "Okay so what you want me to do now?" I say with a yawn and stretch, my back cracking as I do so.

"Play with me!" Seriously, how can she be so loud… Ugh, whatever, at least she distracts me.

I let her pull me off the couch and follow her to the elevator. Down, down we go until the doors open and I'm being pushed out of the tiny room again.

"You look like you just woke up" is how Beth greets me with a chuckle while Lucy drags me past her and into her room.

"I did." I might be glaring at her for laughing.

We spend two. freaking. hours. playing with her dolls or tons of stuffed animals that remind me of the ripped and dirty giraffe sitting in my room. Man, I gotta do something 'bout that one.

Well, if I could somehow get away from this toddler-dream-apocalypse that is Lucy's room. Seriously, there's every single thing a kid could wish for and more. She can never run out of things to play with, and still she needs to keep me here for hours on end playing with everything she can come up with. I mean, I don't mind spending time with her, she's my baby baby sister and I missed her just as much as everyone else here, but that doesn't change the fact that I'm still not a big fan of having to play with dolls for two hours straight. I never was the doll fan anyways.

But I think she's starting to notice me getting more annoyed by the minute, so she tries extra hard to get me to enjoy all this.

I guess it's not hard to tell how glad I am when Torunn stands in the doorway… or not.

"Luce, I think Alex especially likes this one" she says and I know what she's got behind her back and I could kill her for- okay, better not put Torunn and 'kill' in one sentence, at least not out of nightmares. But, whatever, it's too late. I surrender and hit the floor now completely, lying on my back and covering my face for what's to come and not quite suppressing the groan. And then she already turned it on, right next to my head.

That fucking robot. That godforsaken fucking invincible robot.

Okay. James, who since he could talk kept wishing for a puppy every goddamn day, couldn't get one because _someone_ (Beth) has a pretty bad allergy against pretty much any animal fur. So the magical twins of the house Stark came up with the single worst idea they ever had. (Okay, actually not, it was a pretty nice idea, the execution was just completely fucked up.) They decided to build a kind of AI robot dog. Because that's what six years old do right?  
>But they pretty much refused to have Tony andor Bruce help them (because they're grown up okay? "We don't need any help." I like to throw this in their faces at given times). So. They locked themselves up in their personal "little" lab and started working on that robot thing. Within two weeks Bruce, Pepper and Mom had to prevent a) a fire from spreading, b) her kids from dying thanks to toxic gasses (I still have no idea wherever they came from) and c) the freaking dog to explode and kill us all. Seriously, I'm not making this up, the two are crazy.  
>Anyways, after almost dying for the third time in two weeks they were only allowed to keep working on it with Bruce and Tony always at least in the room with them because they wouldn't let them see it (…they were <em>still<em> allowed to keep working on this. But _I_ get grounded for wanting to know if you can shoot a burning arrow and roast a marshmallow this way… you can, by the way. We just happened to have to get completely new targets and I owed Dad a couple arrows… But at least _I_ didn't nearly destroy the whole Tower .times… up to then. They had a few more things coming the next couple years.)

Okay, well, they even managed to finish it without any more really serious accidents, though they were past their schedule of finishing it before James' birthday, so it really was only the robot without any stuffed animal around like they originally planned. They even build in a couple really nice features, like barking, growling, teeth, biting, being a bitch. It could even sneeze! Who doesn't want a robot dog that can sneeze?!

Well, apparently James did like it a lot. So much that he didn't even mind it constantly barking and growling at him. Sadly, after, for some reason I had to keep it from biting everyone's fingers off (because I think that really was a possibility), it kinda turned against me and kept running after me. And because I was really pissed off by this thing, I kicked it away from me when it tried to bite my toe off. It sadly hit the table and James' glass of juice fell over and the solemnly named Rex went completely mad. It ran through the whole room, snapped at everything in its way and his so lovely robotic barks turned into some kind of death-metal scream. I'm also pretty sure my Mom was thinking about getting a gun and stop this pet-terminator.  
>But while everyone was trying not to get killed by that thing, James was having the best day ever, sitting save on the table where Steve put him after he tried to run after Rex. After all, little Rexy was just trying to become friends with us. He wasn't trying to kill us all, no.<p>

Still, it especially loved me and wanted to be my friend, so it eventually managed to give me a loving bite that I'm still convinced should have needed stitches. And between crying and yelling my hatred, I managed to pry it off my foot without losing my toe and threw it against the wall where it then lay in a sad, beeping heap on the floor.

But no, "We don't need any help". Of course James was mad at me for the next _ten_ days. Okay, he was only two years then, but I saved his ass. I didn't build this death puppy for his birthday. No, Vic and Mason were the heroes for getting him the best gift ever and the horrible devil that is me just destroyed it for no reason. How could I. Horrible.

And because they are the greatest siblings to ever live, they repaired Rex. This time though with a final product control by Tony, Bruce and Steve. And everyone else. One of the important things was to get it to stop biting and taking out these knives they called teeth. Although they couldn't (or didn't want to) repair the barking. It still sounded like an Orc scream mixed with the sweet sound of nails scratching on a blackboard. James loved it.

But of course he grew out of it and left it to his precious baby sister by sneaking it in her crib and everyone getting a heart attack when it went off "barking" in the middle of the night.

Lucy thankfully wasn't as obsessed with the whole thing, she liked it but wouldn't really play with it as soon as she found something else. And over the past couple of months, as far as I know, she didn't touch it once.

So now Torunn the asshole crammed it out of the box it was so nicely rotting in and right now it's running against my head or neck or shoulder because Lucy keeps placing it so it runs to me.

"I hate you" I growl, meaning both Torunn and that fucking Robot. But mostly Torunn. But thankfully not only I am screaming when I get a full on Orc scream right in my ear.

This is what makes me get off the floor and grab the freaking thing off the ground. Maybe I should throw it in Torunn's face, but she'd probably just dodge it or throw it back. Though she deserves it, cause now she kicked off a week of Lucy having interest in this thing again and annoying everyone here, even the twins by now. I probably should tell them to destroy it. Or sneak it out of Lucy's room and accidently drop it off the roof myself.

But I can't do that right now, so I just stuff it back in the box where it came from and hope to never see it again.

"Nah, you love me!" I'm being crushed by only one asgardian asshole arm around my shoulder, I shouldn't let her win this. But I'm not exactly in the mood to get in a fight about the terminator pet now, so I settle for the lovely, grumpily growled "No." and have to drag both Lucy and Torunn over to the elevator to get upstairs because I, for one, am hungry after this torture.

"My dearest sister"

"Oh god." Of course she waited for the doors to close to start this. Now I can't run.

Her arm tightens a little around my shoulder and I think now is a good time to either cry or hit her. Her freaking shit eating grin can go to hell.

"I have plans for you today."

Oh god.


	4. great plan

_**Currahee506:**__ See yourself what she's got planned ^^_

_**Horseluvr00:**__ Thank you :3_

_soooooooooo again, I'm awfully sorry for the long absence, I just have a lot to do with school and work and getting my driving licence, but I promise you I'm really doing my best to keep writing this and I hope that you're all still reading this although I keep you waiting this long. I hope you can forgive me and maybe I manage to write these next two free days and get the next chapter out faster, but until then I hope you'll like this and that you tell me what you think_

_._

"No."

"Oh, come on!"

"No, nah, non, niet, nope. Just no, okay?"

"Dude, I'm not taking no as an answer, you should know that by now. Also I have valid arguments."

"What kind of argument do you have that could _possibly_ convince me it is necessary for me to go _shopping_?"

"You need a phone"

"It's not like there are about four people here that could build one within two hours."

"You might've grown again while you were gone. You need new clothes"

"I don't. Man, don't look at me like that, I'm as tall as I was with fourteen, I don't grow any more than that."

"It's fun"

"…are you serious? What the hell is fun about being stuck with tons of people in crammed little stores?"

"Getting new stuff?"

"I don't need new stuff!"

"Just not rotting in this Tower?"

"What, I smell that bad?"

"Damnit Alex, you were _dead_! Is it really too much to ask to spend some time with my sister?"

Not fair. It wasn't really my intention to- ugh, come on, who am I trying to convince here? It's my fault. Can't change that fact. It's my fault they all thought I was dead. It's my fault I almost _was_ dead. And really, it's not that I don't wanna spend time with her, but does it have to be shopping? Couldn't she come up with _anything_ else? I'd be okay spending the whole day standing in a piss-puddle in the subway, rather than that.

But she's just got that talent of getting what she wants. I bet she's spoiled to no end on Asgard.

"Jeez, okay" I say because the last thing I want now is her starting to cry here.

"Awesome!" Oh this goddamn bastard. She really just should become an actress. Not a single trace of her almost crying. And I fall for this every single damn time.

"You're an asshole" I mutter, but only halfheartedly and she's all smiles again, saying "I know" and I still can't believe she always gets me with this.

"What's awesome?" And entrance part two of team "We don't need any help", master in "I've got everything under control" and "No, this won't break your leg, bro, just help me bend this straight" – Victoria Maria Stark!

"My ass."

"Meh, not so much."

"Wow. That was rude" I say, but all she does is chuckle and grab herself an apple because no one in this house seems to have planned to cook anything today.

"So, what's up? Except you whining 'bout your ass."

"Still rude" I say and groan along while Torunn explains the situation just as Lucy runs back in the room from wherever the hell she was again.

"Cool, I'm in" Really? As far as I know she barely likes shopping any more than I do, but that's mostly because she always has something far more important to do, like building a death ray.

She seems to notice my critical look.

"...I need some stuff not everyone here necessarily has to know about"

"Like lady stuff or Stuff To Build Another Death Ray - stuff" Torunn asks.

"Mmmh bit of both, but mostly the latter"

"...is it legal or do you just need someone pulling off a fake ID?" I'm asking this because that would explain why she needs to go with me and Torunn. And it wouldn't be the first time she'd try something like this.

"No it's legal, it's just some wires ...and stuff... oh come on, don't look at me like this! I'm just planning something, and no it's nothing dangerous."

She said the same about that robot. But I guess we're better off not having anything to do with this, so I don't press any further.

"Don't leave me alone!" Again. Why is Lucy always screaming in my ear. Why not Torunn's for a change? "I wanna come too!"

Okay so this makes an overly excited Lucy, a manipulating and proud of that Torunn, a not necessarily completely legal Vic and me who doesn't really wanna leave my room... Yay.

"I'll get Dad's credit card" Vic announces and makes her way to the elevator.

"Seriously?"

"Eh...yeah? You need new stuff - you have the whole Been Dead For Months Bonus aaaand I've got science on my side so" with a shrug she's gone and Torunn takes that as her cue to set Lucy on her shoulders and almost push me down the stairs to force me into a pair of shoes and tell our parents + Lucy's where we're going. Everyone seems pretty surprised to see me going along with really barely any protesting... I mean, I already tried, so what's the point now?

When we get into the elevator, Victoria is already inside with the promised credit card and a list in her hands.

"…Do I even want to know what's on that list?" I ask and she rolls her eyes at me.

"It's not like we're constantly planning on destroying the whole planet, okay?" No? "That's just some stuff I have to get for Mason or he won't stop bugging and keeps poking me with his crutches."

"How come he and James can get out of this kind of stuff easily without complaint but I can't? Why do I have to go shopping just because I'm a girl, that's sexist. If I have to go through hell they should too. Or maybe they'd love shopping, who knows, they never come along. They should totally be forced to come along the same way I am."

"Eh, the thing is, I don't really want this to take twenty hours because of Mason being kinda crippled at the moment and I know for a fact that James rather stays at baseball training right now than being forced to go shopping with us" Vic says as we step out of the lobby of the Tower and start towards the busy streets.

"Oh but you don't think I have something better to do than that?"

"No" is the prompt answer Torunn gives me. "Also I don't think I'd be able to handle both _your_ horrible grumpy grump mood _and _James and Mason's. Plus Vic probably vanishes as soon as she got her stuff."

"You do realize I'm still walking beside you? Or do I just look like a tiny ant from your perspective?" at that I have to laugh and forget to be the grumpy grump for a second.

"Haha. Maybe I should just step on you little ants"

"Please, at least I'd be done with this torture then."

"Well then I just have to live with the fact that I'm being bullied by ants." Insert dramatic and ironic sniffing here. God, I'm not gonna survive this day.

We walk the short distance to the subway because we're too lazy to walk all the not really that long way. And if not already before, now in the packed cabin, people _stare_.  
>I mean, okay I guess you kinda get used to that, considering we're the kids of earth's mightiest heroes and all that stuff, so there are sometimes people starring or some guys taking pictures. But it's not really hard to guess that the story of one of these kids being dead makes rounds pretty fast. So, of course there are people trying to figure out if I'm a zombie running around here or what.<p>

"I'm sick of this shit already" I mutter as another boy around twelve points us out to his friends.

"Oh come on, that really was to be expected, don't you think?"

"Yeah and you know it was to be expected that I will complain about every single thing here. Like a shitload of people staring at "us" like zombies."

"Man, usually you're the best at ignoring them" Vic adds, though I am pretty sure she just forgot her sarcasm sign cause for the most part, if the thing called paparazzi attack occurs, then I'm usually the one calling them out on their shit or nicely and very calmly asking them to leave us the fuck alone.

"Yeah, right, I forgot."

"Just ignore it okay?"

I just scoff at that and stare at the boys until they look away uncomfortably. This is gonna be fun.


	5. I missed this

_**Currahee506:**__ Yeah she should, but this is definitely the creative way of punishment for her vanishing like that, so it won't be that easy ^^_

_Wow, okay, that was fast… Hey, be proud of me :D I sadly have to go back to school tomorrow so I'll see how fast I'm gonna be on the next chapter. But I hope you still kinda like this one, I wanted to make some interaction between everyone, so there isn't really a lot happening in this one. I still haven't figured the whole story out completely yet, but don't worry, we're getting there. And I hope to make the next chapter more interesting, so I hope I won't take years for that one too. And like always, leave me a review, tell me what you think. You can also tell me any kind of prompts for the _being family_ thing if you want me to write anything specific. You just have to tell me, I'm all ears.^^ _

_And now I just hope you'll like this and tell me what you think_

.

Okay so the whole shopping thing _was_ that bad and I didn't leave a single opportunity to not mention this. I managed to bring Victoria's mood down and Torunn's just a little bit but Lucy's is unbreakable. She got her ice cream and is happily seated on Torunn's shoulders, although the giant is protesting because she could get chocolate on her ridiculously expensive blouse this way. But seriously, Torunn's mood barely changed although I was trying so damn hard to make it a horrible day for her. But with like two hundred bags filled to the top with all kinds of clothes and whatnot she _can't_ stop grinning. Really, it's not possible.

Victoria didn't vanish as soon as she got her stuff but that might have something to do with Torunn leading us ways that _never_ got even close to where Vic wanted to go.

The girl got even her to walk out of this hell with three bags from which only one carries the stuff she actually wanted to get. Which really is only some wires and metal thingies. She made a point of rubbing it in our faces that she was not doing anything illegal, though I'm pretty sure it can still turn into something not quite legal in their hands.

I have exactly one bag in my hand and that only because at some point I just stopped trying. But Torunn only managed to talk me into buying one jeans and two shirts and that took about all her power. The other thing in the bag is the new phone which I didn't need to buy because Victoria kept telling me that Tony and/or her could make one way better within the rest of the day, but Torunn quite literally pushed her away and me to the mobile phones lined up because I have the feeling me spending money that I don't even have (because of my very great plan of taking a flight to Amsterdam, so it all really did go on Tony's credit card) and forcing me to spend even more time in the goddamn mall is Torunn's way of punishing me for vanishing without a word… Thinking about it, the last thing I said to her or Vic were 'leave me alone' because they were trying to get me out of my room again. And the next day I was gone and left them thinking I was dead. Great person here, I probably deserve worse than going shopping.

But Victoria battling the guy Torunn got to tell me which phone to get was really kinda funny, although I felt sorry for him after about two minutes of Vic talking and talking and not planning to ever stop about what the hell a good phone should have. In the end she told the guy we wouldn't need his help, picked one of the phones she deemed okay and told me while paying for it that she wouldn't let me use it until she had her hands on it to make it better. For me it seems to be a good enough phone but apparently it still needs to be Stark-approved before I can use it so, whatever makes her happy.

I'm just glad that we managed to get Victoria out of the store with all her stuff. She looked like she was in heaven in this tiny, smelling room stuffed full with wires and weird looking guys and I don't think we'd be able to get them out of there if Mason came along.

While finally making our way out of there, we stopped in a kids shop and I got Lucy a plush penguin cause I'm pretty sure she doesn't have one yet and I'm less sure about my ability to fix that giraffe, though I'm gonna try.

Then we all went for ice cream and rode off into the sunset.

Yeah, if only…

The whole time in the mall people were starring and taking pictures and some even came up to us to ask what happened and my answer was probably more often than not 'well, friggididoo not dead I guess'.

I'm not really sure how to handle the whole situation and neither seem Torunn or Victoria. I mean, I wasn't here to see all the dramatic 'Alexandra Barton – dead' headlines unfold and the way my family reacted to them. And I'm really not exactly the best in our family reacting to the world's interest in us, so I think maybe it's better if I keep my mouth shut until I have some kind of idea how the hell to explain this.

"Okay, we've got that phone, you got all your since stuff, you've got a ton of new clothes and Lucy's got even more toys now, can we _please_ go home now?" I ask and really have to hold myself back from punching that guy that's been running after us with his phone for five minutes and asking the same goddamn question the whole damn time.

To my surprise Torunn seems to have had enough of that guy too, so she just nods her head and picks up the pace. The thing is, her legs are like as long as James is tall. And she always seems to forget that, if she walks at her normal pace, all the somewhat normal sized people around her have to jog to keep up with her.

"Hey, remember the ants" Victoria says and grabs Torunn's arm to slow her down. I'm considering asking her to just magic us out of here but that's not really an officially known thing she can do and me being back from the dead is probably enough for New York for a week, they don't need to have us randomly vanishing on top of that. But seriously, if that guy asks one more time what happened, I'm gonna throw his phone on the street.

The happy babbling from Lucy is kind of entertaining but still not distracting me from all the eyes on us.

Well, at least that guy running after us doesn't follow us out of the subway. Still, I'm damn glad when we're finally back in the elevator at home.

"Wow, you made it out alive!" Tony greets us from somewhere.

"Yeah, I'm surprised about that too" I say while Vic fishes the phone out of my bag and I kick off my shoes and very accidently hit Torunn with them. "Eh, what exactly are you doing, Tony?"

"Eh, changing the light bulb? Obviously?"

"Right, obviously." Tony is basically only wearing the boots of his iron man suit and is currently avoiding hitting his head on the ceiling while screwing in a new light bulb. "You got rid of the rule 'no iron man suits outside the lab' while I was gone?"

"Uhm, no, Pepper doesn't know about this here, I just kinda lost the ladder…"

"How the hell do you lose a ladder, Dad?" Victoria asks before I can and she plops down on the couch and starts fidgeting with my phone.

"How the hell do you lose your shoe in a park?"

"That was six years ago!"

"Three. It's been three years ago and it's still hilarious." He barely finishes his sentence before he crashes into the ceiling and tumbles as gracefully as only a Stark can manage into the coffee table.

"_That_ was hilarious!" Vic calls over the noise and makes not one move to help her Dad up so I decide to be nice now and help him instead.

"Ugh, I should ground you."

"You shouldn't, she'd just build a death ray or something like that" Torunn says from where she's done chasing after Lucy to get her to clean her face that's still covered in ice cream.

"That is true" Vic says and curses at the phone in her hands.

"Then I just take all your stuff" Tony says and makes a move to pick Victoria's bag up.

"You wouldn't dare" she says and yes, he would. So she drops the phone on the couch and makes a dive for him, pulling him back down to the floor. They end up with Tony being wrestled to the ground by his twelve years old daughter, ripping the bag out of his hand and not planning on getting up ever.

"So, not grounded?" she asks with the creepiest serial-killer grin she can muster and Tony groans and shakes his head in defeat, if just so she gets up again. When she does though, he's quick in picking her up and just throwing her back on the couch.

Man, I missed this.

"Okay, we have literally nothing to eat so who takes up on the great honor of feeding the long lost archer without a job?"

Wow, somehow this whole greeting thing goes over all our heads.

"Really? No one?"

"I told you, Clint." Huh, Dad's dramatic entrance kinda hid Mom behind him.

"Hey, don't look at me, I'm your daughter, shouldn't it be the other way round? You're still able to walk, I'll feed you once you can't even do that anymore. Till then it should be your job to feed me right? And today you didn't pull off a great job at that, I'm pretty freaking hungry."

The only response I get from him is a weird grimace and a laugh from Mom before Dad sticks his head into the fridge.

"Dude, there is no way there isn't anything to eat in this Tower" Tony interferes and pushes Dad away from the fridge. That ends in both of them pushing each other until Tony is pushed against Torunn, Torunn holds onto him and both stumble to the floor while Lucy is still sitting on the counter laughing her ass off.

"Jesus, just order take-out" Mom says after a moment of Dad celebrating himself for managing to send his niece and Tony to the floor over an empty fridge.

I agree but the thing with take-out in this family is that it basically takes longer than cooking something because no one can settle for anything and then the restaurants need like two hours to get our order done and delivered.

"Alright, super-spy-mommy won. Jarvis, tell everyone to get their asses up here" Tony agrees from where he's still waiting for someone to help him off the floor which is never gonna happen.

It already takes like ten minutes for everyone at home to get into the elevator and up here, and we're still three guys down – Pepper (still at a meeting as far as I know, because Tony doesn't give a crap about Stark Industries), James (Baseball training) and Steve (picking James up from training). It takes us another twenty minutes to settle on _what_ to order – Chinese, for now, though that can still change again. And after exactly forty-three minutes everyone here settled on a pizza.

We have to draw lots about who is the lucky bastard that has to order. Thank god it's not me again, it's Bruce. Though we usually order at the same places, it's always a freakishly long list that they don't get right on the first two tries, at least when I'm calling, and they always need at least an hour to get it here, if not longer. I bet it takes extra long because they are fighting about who will deliver to us because they know by now that though it's a huge ass delivery, the one delivering to _the Avengers_ is always getting pretty huge tips.

Anyways, while we're waiting for the food, 50% of the star spangled family and Pepper to arrive, Mason, Victoria, Tony and Bruce are fighting each other over my phone. Or more precisely, what's left from it. They basically completely picked it apart and have all the parts scattered across the table. I really have no idea why the hell they think that's necessary but as long as it doesn't randomly explode I'm cool with it.

I settled on the other end of the table with Lucy and Dad and we're currently all busy drawing unicorns and "elephants", as Dad calls the little potatoes he's drawing, and whatnot for Lucy to hang in every freaking room she can. There are really thousands of drawings, made and copyright by Lucy, hanging in about every single room. Alone in my room are like three unicorns, one kinda creepy clown, five pictures of the whole family, flowers, butterflies, literally anything she can come up with.

Today it takes around an hour until Jarvis announces the arrival of our food, at which point the rest is already at home too. It's decided that Torunn and Thor can go get the food, considering they're probably eating the most anyways – Tony's logic. I would help but saaaaadly I have to draw rainbows here, so.

In return to no one helping them, everyone gets their pizza carton unlovingly slapped down on the table and the general chaotic talking starts up. God, I missed them.


	6. Black

_**Currahee506:**__ I WOULD but the thing is, the story is set in May at the moment and Lucy's birthday is January 3__rd__ (Yes, I wrote down birthdays for all the kids) soooo it'd probably take a bit too long for that :D_

_I don't really have a lot to say about this, except that I'm proud about the time range between the last updates^^ I hope I can keep up with that pace and that more of you will tell me what you think about this chapter ^^_

_._

"Alright, no. If you wanna watch that boxing match you gotta watch it on one of the twenty other TV's. Tonight's kids night here, if you wanna call it that. So everyone go get your PJ's and Lucy friendly movies and me some ice cream and get back up here in five minutes! Go!" … seriously, how come everyone listens to Torunn just like that? That's something to do with her being a princess and all that? That just as soon as she speaks everyone does as she says? Maybe it's another of her magic tricks which she just doesn't tell anyone about. Maybe she can secretly control other people's minds. I wouldn't tell that either, it's got its advantages.

Still, of course every one of our parents leaves to watch the match, which I actually wanted to see too to be honest, and the rest of us gets downstairs, gets comfy, gets food that just magically appeared, movies that probably no one but Lucy really wants to see, and gets back upstairs to push all the couches together.

We all end up lying more or less in a heap, mostly because Mason takes up most of the couches. Lucy pretty much throws herself over mine and James' laps and yells at us to stop talking and watch the goddamn movie.

Two thirds into the movie and she's out like a light and we all, okay maybe not James and Torunn, would prefer to watch, I don't know, a horror movie or something like that, but we can't exactly do that with these sissies here so Mason, Vic and I are stuck watching the next two kids movies before James drifts off too.

Torunn still won't let us watch anything else than some _really _bad romcom, "because they could wake up and be scarred for the rest of their lives" but really, James and Lucy couldn't wake anything so it's basically Torunn telling us to do what she says because she might need to cry if we watched a horror movie… or anything cool. Really, Torunn's the person with the worst movie taste I know, even worse than Bruce.

It takes half of another shitty movie for Torunn to finally fall asleep too and Victoria immediately jumps to stop it and start the most harmless horror movie we can come up with, which happens to be "Chucky". We keep it quiet and it's really not scary at all, but it's far more entertaining watching the creepy doll poison a priest than the goddamn 'boy meets girl' crap that would never even happen in real life anyways.

By the time Chucky killed everyone, Mason and Vic are asleep too and I'm drifting off, so I untangle myself from Lucy and James and put all the food/trash on the table for now. I sidestep the rubble of coffee table that still lies next to the couch before I throw a couple of blankets over everyone and me on the couches too.

.

Koslow is leaning over me and grins while pulling the syringe out of my arm again.

"Vy ne dolzhny pytalis' uyti, Alexandra" (You shouldn't have tried to get away). "Enjoy" is all he says before the red light is back and he vanishes in it. The siren doesn't start slow or quiet, it's immediately on full volume and I think my ears might start to bleed … or explode.

I can't get off this table, I'm restrained again and I can't move at all, they even bound my head to the table.

The light keeps changing colors and it's making me crazy. Or it would if I weren't so freaked out by that goddamn Asian guy appearing out of nowhere. He doesn't say anything, he never speaks. He just stares at me with this creepy grin and I just want out of here. My heart is beating like crazy and I forget how to breathe for a moment.

He only keeps grinning and without warning throws a punch at me, right at my throat. I'm wheezing and choking and I never imagined it to hurt _that _bad. He doesn't give me a break to catch my breath, he only throws more punches at my face, my stomach, rips, _everywhere_. I'm sobbing and I'd beg him to stop if I could talk, but I'm just too busy trying to _breathe_ again. Everything burns. There's blood flowing out of my nose and mouth and one tooth already fell out and I wish I could spit it out before choking on it too. My nose and jaw are definitely broken, a couple of rips too and I think my left arm as well.

I have no idea how I'm still conscious.

I think he'll never stop, not until I choked to death on the blood in my mouth or just because he beats all air out of my lungs. How long has he been doing this?

I should have never tried to get out of here. I knew it couldn't work. I don't know how many times they strapped me to this table now, it feels like the thousands time and like the first. I really lost all touch to reality I think. I don't know what's a hallucination anymore, for all I know this could just as well be real. The syringe doesn't mean anything, this could really be happening here right now. It feels real. It feels so damn real.

Until it stops.

The man is no longer beating me up, he disappeared. The tooth and blood in my mouth are gone too. I still can't breathe, though. It all hurts too damn much that it just _has_ to be real. It can't feel so real to just be a hallucination.

I'm not restrained any longer. The table underneath me just disappeared and I'm lying in a heap on the floor, trying to get air back into my lungs.

Someone is crying, someone other than me.

I gotta get up. I push myself up with my right arm, my left cradled to my chest because it still. Hurts.  
>I manage to stand up on shaking legs and look around.<p>

I'm in that creepy tiled room surrounded by a plastic curtain with a diversity of different colored splatters on it.

I take a few moments to relish in the fact that I can somewhat breathe again, before I pull the curtain to the side and my breath immediately stops again.

There's some kind of cage/cell in front of me with my whole family inside. All of them. My parents, Thor, Beth, James, Peter, even Peter's aunt and uncle. They're all beaten up and most of them knocked out. Those who are awake don't seem to see me. Their eyes are black.

I don't know what that's supposed to tell me but my heart is beating like crazy nonetheless.

Aaand the guy is back. With a gun.

"Shoot them." It's the first time he ever speaks. I try to take a step back but he immediately reaches for my not yet broken arm and pulls me to his side. I'm struggling against him but he only twists my arm until he's got the gun shoved in my hand.

I try to lift my arm, intending to shoot him, but he twists my arm until it cracks. I'm screaming and my knees threaten to give away, but he keeps me upright with his grip on my arm. One hand is keeping the gun in my hand, my finger over the trigger and aimed at my family. The other one is on my neck, keeping my head in place so I don't look away.

I'm about to beg him to stop, but then he already makes me pull the trigger and Jane, Pepper, Bruce, Lucy, _every. Single. One._ Drops dead to the floor, black eyes on me. I'm screaming and crying and basically just trying to get him to stop, to just kill me, I don't care. I just want this to stop.

"perestat' plakat' , suka!" (Stop crying, bitch) I barely hear him. I'm kinda too distracted by having shot my whole family.

He won't have any of this though. He kicks me in the knee and it cracks and I'm pushed to the floor. He's hovering over me and I don't struggle anymore, I'm just crying and hope for this to end. I have no idea what this is anymore. Hallucination or not, I don't know. I don't care, I just need it to stop.

He's pressing a cloth to my face, covering my mouth and nose and maybe he's just gonna make me suffocate now.  
>Or not.<p>

Okay something is really off here, there was definitely no hose here before. And no, he's not gonna make me suffocate, he makes me drown.

I heard my parents mention waterboarding one time and I asked them what exactly that is, but they wouldn't tell me what that _felt_ like. They both went through this shit a couple of times, but I didn't really get why they wouldn't tell me.  
>Now I do.<br>I don't think I _could_ describe what that feels like. You try to breathe in on reflex and the only thing there is, is water and you end up choking because you need to get it out of your lungs but at the same time you try to get some goddamn air back into your system. And then you panic and can't think straight anymore.

There's a part of me that's okay with this. A part of me that thinks I deserve to suffer – I killed my whole family. Then there's a part that just wants this to end, that doesn't give a crap anymore. And of course a part that doesn't want to die because I'm only frigging sixteen years old, I'm simply not supposed to die yet! But I just killed my whole family. Why shouldn't I just die now? It'd make everything easier.

The water leaves and I'm left sputtering and gasping for breath. The cloth is being lifted off my face and instead of that guy, Torunn's face is hovering over me. Black eyes.

It's a reflex, really. I elbow her in the face and roll to the side.

I fall down somewhere, but it isn't anything high. Now I'm lying with my face pressed into a carpet. What the hell.

"Alex" wait. I take as deep a breath as I can and roll onto my back. Five pairs of eyes are staring at me, none of them black like just moments before.

I cover my face with my hands and try to calm my breathing down, with no success. My arms hurt. Why is it that I'm left with the pain I dream about after I already woke up? It was just a goddamn dream but god, it didn't feel like one. It felt so freakishly real.

I don't want to look up. I can hear Torunn crying because I might've broken her nose and Mason trying to console her and Lucy.

Just a dream.

I can hear someone hopping down the couch and kneeling down next to me, but I don't want to look up. I still can't really breathe and I'm crying and shaking and I just hit Torunn.

I know someone's gonna reach out for me, but I still flinch and nearly hit them again. Victoria says my name again and slowly grips my wrists. I let her pull me up so I'm sitting, but I'm not looking at her. Everything still hurts and I generally feel like throwing up. I don't get what's so fucked up with my brain that I dream about getting hurt and the pain won't leave when I woke up.

I know everyone's still staring at me but I just – I don't know what to do here right now. I don't want fucking nightmares, that's for sure. I don't want to be responsible for people dying. I never wanted to kill anyone.

Thinking about all this makes breathing and my crying only harder and I let Vic pull me into a hug without struggling.

"Just a dream. Don't worry, it's just us." She keeps mumbling stuff like that and I actually start to calm down.

Eventually we're sitting here for like five or ten minutes without anyone else saying anything before she pulls away and grins at me.

"khoroshiy prikladom" she says and though I still feel like shit I can't help but laugh at this.

She once asked me to teach her some insults in Russian 'cause she was having troubles with some guy in her class and that is the only thing she remembered and she still thinks it means something like 'fucking twat' but it actually means 'nice butt' and I still have to laugh about this because she managed to make a nine year old cry by repeatedly yelling at him that he had a nice butt.

I hug her again with a small smile, if just so I don't have to look up again and see Torunn bleeding because of me and Lucy probably scared as hell.

And because I'm scared to see black eyes when I look back up.


End file.
